Poll of the Day > How Much Do You Have In savings

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LinkPizza posted...

Trialia posted...

FrndNhbrHdCEman posted...

Aaantlion posted...

"Average American" includes people on the dole, so the numbers are greatly distorted. Plus people on an internet forum will most likely be more affluent than the average person (or, at the very least, skews higher than the general norm)

Aren't you on the dole atm?

As far as people on the net being better off than the norm may go... not anybody I know of...!

And as for having internet access... It may not be a "thing" in a lot of places in the States (I've heard it happens in a couple of cities, anyway), but here in the UK, our public libraries have computers & provide a certain degree of internet access for free (usually one free hour with the option to pay for a second, though my own local library don't charge for the second hour either). I know a number of homeless people or people with otherwise insecure or severely impoverished living situations who spend a lot of time in the library I normally use sometimes to save having to use utilities at home, sometimes just to stay indoors. So it's wrong to assume internet access makes somebody rich. By worldwide standards? Maybe. But within their own societies? No.

You have to pay for extra internet time at the library? Maybe its because I havent been to one in a long time, but I dont ever remember paying to use the internet...

*shrugs* Eh. I don't know about where you live, but my local library used to charge a pound for the second hour of computer time, till about a month ago. The first hour was always free though.
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Trialia posted...

LinkPizza posted...

Trialia posted...

FrndNhbrHdCEman posted...

Aaantlion posted...

"Average American" includes people on the dole, so the numbers are greatly distorted. Plus people on an internet forum will most likely be more affluent than the average person (or, at the very least, skews higher than the general norm)

Aren't you on the dole atm?

As far as people on the net being better off than the norm may go... not anybody I know of...!

And as for having internet access... It may not be a "thing" in a lot of places in the States (I've heard it happens in a couple of cities, anyway), but here in the UK, our public libraries have computers & provide a certain degree of internet access for free (usually one free hour with the option to pay for a second, though my own local library don't charge for the second hour either). I know a number of homeless people or people with otherwise insecure or severely impoverished living situations who spend a lot of time in the library I normally use sometimes to save having to use utilities at home, sometimes just to stay indoors. So it's wrong to assume internet access makes somebody rich. By worldwide standards? Maybe. But within their own societies? No.

You have to pay for extra internet time at the library? Maybe its because I havent been to one in a long time, but I dont ever remember paying to use the internet...

*shrugs* Eh. I don't know about where you live, but my local library used to charge a pound for the second hour of computer time, till about a month ago. The first hour was always free though.

It might have something to do with where the library was. The one I use to use was next to the school. Maybe I'll check one of the two local libraries here and see. I just never remember paying. I remember getting a ticket and having to wait for yours to open up. We did have a time limit. But we could get more time if nobody else was waiting. If someone else was waiting, we would have to go back in line...
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LinkPizza posted...

Its not always that they are irresponsible with money.

It often is, though. A LOT of Americans who are running debt are doing so because they have a very specific idea of what life is supposed to be, and cannot downscale their expectations to meet their income, so they wind up overspending in a lot of cases. It's especially common with younger people who are just entering the job market for the first time, and who still expect to have a quality of life equal to or exceeding whatever they grew up with (on their parents' money).

This isn't the case for everyone who's "poor", but there are a lot of cases where reevaluation of living expenses and lifestyle choices in general could free up a lot of money being spent that isn't being spent well. There are a lot of ways to scale back cost of living that most people don't even bother with, either getting trapped in a loop of living paycheck to paycheck or actively running up unnecessary credit card debt.
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